User:Tranquitas/Multi-image

Multi-image is the now largely obsolete practice and business of using 35mm slides projected by multiple projectors onto one or more screens in synchronization with an audio voice-over and music track. Multi-image productions are also known as multi-image slide presentations, slides shows and diaporamas and are a specific form of multimedia or audio-visual production.

One of the hallmarks of multi-image was the use of the wide screen panorama. Precisely overlapping slides were placed in slide mounts with soft-edge density masks; when the resulting images were projected, the images would blend seamlessly on the screen to create the panorama. By cutting and dissolving between images in the projectors, animation effects were created in panorama format.

Description

Multi-Image presentations were a unique form of communication to audiences of various sizes, to meet a variety of communication and entertainment needs. In general, multi-image can be defined as being:

• Based largely on analog production tools and technologies including art and audio production and film-based photography. 35mm slide film has high resolution and color range and are based on grain and dye-clouds rather than on a raster pattern, which when projected often is preceived as being more realistic, uniform, and detailed than digital images.
• Multi-disciplinary in terms of the types of skills required to create and stage multi-image presentations.
• Venue driven; multi-image presentations had specific requirements for the spaces they were staged in.

The use of projected photographic images such as lantern slides for entertainment has a longing history, dating back to the early 1800s. Later, in 1908 L. Frank Baum had a traveling show that included slides, film, and actors describing the land of Oz. Throughout the years improvments in techology took place and applications for slides as a form of entertainment continued to expand. During the 1960s slides started to use automated syncronization of the audio and the slides and found use in instructional environments and large churches.

Multi-Image Business

Multi-image as a business thrived during the 1970 and 1980’s. Multi-image presentations ranged from single projector shows run by an audio cassette, such as in a Caramate projector-viewer[1] to large projected events for business meetings and conventions where multiple shows would be presented and often were rear-projected by 24 or more projerctors.

Creating and presenting multi-image productions involved a relativley large number of specialized skills, equipment, and facilities to produce. During the height of multi-image a number of types of businesses were directly engaged in the industry which employed thousands of specialists that ranged from producers and designers, writers, artists, typesetters, photographers, photo lab technicians, audio technicians, programmers, staging specialists as well as others associated with these disciplines.

A professional organization, The Association for Multi-image International (AMI) was created and had numerous active chapters around the world. The AMI held an annual convention and multi-image competition. Other organizations such as the National Audiovisual Association (NAVA) which held the COMMTEX International trade show and publications such as the Audio Visual Communication Review strongly supported the multi-image industry.

Multi-image presentations were produced through a wide range of companies, including:

• Companies that specifically were established as multi-image production companies and could offer full services to clients. Most of these companies have either closed or changed their business model to focus on marketing or event planing, video, or computer based presentations.
• Companies that offered multi-image as a portion of their overall work, such as ad agencies, marketing, and creative services companies.
• Companies who specialized in one or more of the general disciplines used in the production of multi-image and offered multi-image as a service, such as photographers and photo labs.
• Individual contractors who served as producers, directors, designers or provided other talent needed to create multi-image presentations.

Many large corporations had within their company multi-image production divisions or production units set up to produce multi-image slides and productions for use by those companies. Educational institutions also made extensive use of multi-image and employed multi-image specialists within their institutions.

An entire industry grew around supplying the tools and equipment neeeded to supply and support the multi-image production.

• Corporations who manufactured and sold basic equipment used in the production of multi-image, such as 35mm slide projectors, film, slide mounts, soft-edge density masks and other items. The list of suppliers for the multi-image industry was extensive with a number of companies attaining international importance for the products they produced.
• Manufacturers of multi-image optical slide cameras and slide projector programming hardware. Specialized highly precise camera systems were developed for the multi-image market, featuring pin-registered film movements capable of making multiple exposures, controlled back-lit color light sources, motorized multi-axis compounds for precise positioning of artwork, and long-roll film loads. Slide projector programming computers and dissolve equipment and software was developed to synchronize the slides with the audio by providing precise time control over slide tray positioning and lamp fade rates to create multi-image animation.
• Other major types of hardware, materials and services were used in multi-image production such as photo typesetting machines, film processors, slide projector stands,shipping cases, projection screens, audio production and playback equipment, and staging scaffolds and lighting rigs.

Multi-Image presentations were largely venue driven and requiring sufficient space for projection and control over lighting in the projection and view space. Numerous companies provided staging equipment and staff to run the presentations. Hotels, convention centers, and other venues specifically were set up to meet the requirements of the presentations and the audience experience. Schools and businesses frequently maintained multi-image services within their institutions which were staffed with AV specialists. Smaller presentations such as single projector slide synchronized shows often were duplicated for wider distribution. Many photo processing labs specialized in creating duplicate slide sets. Since most large productions were shown a limited number of times, in order to archive and distribute a presention and to show the production to potential clients a video transfer often was made, requiring specialized equipment. Several companies developed around providing transfer services to multi-image producers.

The multi-image industry as a whole was impacted by personal computing. Driven by changes in technology and by economic considerations, multi-image has almost entirely replaced by video presentations and by readily available computer based technologies such as using laptop computers running PowerPoint and projecting through digital projectors. Visual presentation and photo and graphics editing software programs have allowed a wider range of communicators quick, flexible, and easy access to the tools and technologies needed to create presentations. Digital photography has reduced the need for laboratory services and complex equipment, all of which has quickly brought a close to the multi-image industry.

Multi-Image Production Technologies

The art and business of multi-image drew from many older existing technologies, the creative uses of those technologies essentially made it a new form of communications art drawing on a diverse set of skills. When a multi-image project was initiated, various overall mangement roles were required to provide direction, planning, and project management. These roles generally involved the activities similiar to those found in other media industries, such as creative, visual, and technical directors, producers, production managers, and writers. Often individuals with the various production skills would fill these roles as well as performing their production roles. Multi-image productions in general were deadline driven and it was common that the production process would be non-linear, allowing for multiple activities to take place with overlapping roles.

Art and Design

Multi-image was in large part a visual medium and the visual quality of a presentation was based on using photographs or artwork created for use in the presentation as source material. 35mm slides could be used directly as they were originally taken. Often the original photographs were masked or duplicated for positioning and sizing. In some instances, 35mm cameras modified for pin-registertion were used to create animated sequences.

Artwork produced for multi-image presentations in general was based on one of two forms of top-lit reflective copy artwork: 1.) materials that were produced and copied directly to slides to be used in the production or 2.) color or image separated layered photomechanical art that would be copied to high-contrast masks which were then used to create slides. This second process was called optical printing and used many of the basic principles from photomechanical prepress art used in offset printing, silk-screen printing, and cel animation.

Flat art was created by using a variety of standard graphic illustration techniques, using pen and ink, airbrush, paints, from clip art, colored paper, transfer lettering such as Letraset, and by copying from existing materials on a copy stand or on optical slide camera. Cel art, such as found in cel animation was also used.

Art used in optical printing was based on the use of high-contrast photomechanical materials such as PMTs[2], black and white type, rubylith and other materials. Mechanical phototypesetting was done by a variety of means including the Visual Graphics Corporation PhotoTypositor[3] and the Compugraphic EditWriter[4] at companies that specialized in providing typography. When making artwork for multi-image presentations, photographs, transparencies, and film images or continuous tone film or airbrushed masks could also be used as part of the camera-ready artwork.

The color or image separated layers of artwork were pin-registered using a variety of standard pin systems including 1/4 inch, Oxberry, and Acme. The artwork was created on a light table or animation disc to provide back lighting. Often the art was created based on a grid system where the artwork elements would be aligned to an enlarged copy of the grid found in the optical copy or slide camera reticle. This alignment could be used to accurately position images and art elements throughout the process from the creation of the artwork to the final projected images. This process also allowed the imagery use to be interchangeable from slide to slide.

Audio Production

The audio track of a multi-image show provided a framework for the timing of the presentation and for the sequencing and animations of the slides. These were produced generally on 1/4 inch audio tape on multi-track tape recorders such as models by TEAC which allowed for having two tracks or channels for stereo sound and one for the synchronization or clicktrack which was used to encode and playback the signals for the dissolve units. The audio and synchronization tracks were normally separated by a blank track to prevent any carryover of the synchronization cues into the audio playback. Audio editing of the music of voice-over was done manually to create a scratch track, usually with a cutting block and tape. Once the audio edits were completed, the final version would be copied to another tape, either to 1/4 inch, cassette or other format so that there tape used to run the presentation would be a fresh tape without any physical cuts made on the tape.

Printing with Light

Completed artwork was copied under top lights on a pin-registered camera on a high contrast film such as Kodaline or Kodalith to create 35mm mattes used in the optical slide printing process. When needed, pin-registered positive mattes known as countermattes were made by contact printing from the mattes. When a set of mattes were completed, the optical slide camera was used to assemble the separate images onto a single frame of film by making multiple exposures through the mattes.

Optical slide cameras often have compounds for positioning both artwork and the mattes relative to the camera head. A compound will typically have horizontal and vertical movement capabilities as well as rotation and can be motorized. Optical slide cameras also usually have motorized movement of the camera toward and away from the compound to allow for resizing the image on the camera. Cameras that are completely motorized also often have some form of memory so that moves and exposures can be saved and repeated at another time. Optical slide cameras generally use a color head of the same kind that is found in a photographic enlarger to provide colored light that is balanced for the color sensitivity of the film that is being used and to provide color light for the separate exposures that are made through the mattes.

The optical slide camera could be used to crteate a number of types of slides and special effects commonly used in multi-image presentations:

• Duplicates: copies of transparencies
• Copy slides: slides made by top-light copying of artwork or illustrations
• Title burns: made by making multiple exposures through a series of mattes, such as text slides
• Color on color slides: Similar to burn slides but with a color background, often requiring countermattes
• Step and repeat: Using a compound, making a series of exposures where the compound of the camera is moved slightly between each exposure
• Movements: long exposures made from a backlit matte, the shutter is open while the compound and the camera move the matte creating a streaking effect
• Glow effects: using a light diffusing material while exposing the backlight through a matte to create soft edges around the image on the matte
• Filter effects: using color, star and other types of camera filters for special effects
• Image effects: by either manipulating the mattes and countermattes of by positioning transparencies while duplicating them, posterizations, inserts, split frames, and panoramas can be created
• Camera effects: Some optical slide cameras have the capabilities for in-camera mattes, bi-packing, and rotoscoping

Slides created by these methods of combinations of these methods can be made to align and animate when projected, creating what was considered the visual multi-image experience.

sprockets

On the Road

Room environment, room lighting, scaffolding and stands, drapes and lights, alignment, show-time, theatric special effects like pyrotechnics, breakaway screens, breakdown and optical transfers trucks driven through screens

Notiable Multi-Image Names

The following lists contain names of companies and individuals that may no longer be in the multi-image business or are now doing business under different names and ownership.

Companies specializing in Multi-Image

• Caribiner International
• DD&B Studios
• Donna Lawrence Productions
• Eyesongs[5][6]
• Image Stream (Los Angles, CA)
• Jack Morton Worldwide[7]
• Jam Handy Organization[8].
• Maritz[9]
• Media Loft
• Metavision [10]
• Mind's Eye (San Francisco)
• Multivision Productions[11]
• Odyssey Visual Design
• Photo-Synthesis
• Watts Silverstein (Seattle, WA)

Multi-Image Hardware and Supplies

• Arion
• Audio-Visual Labratories (AVL)
• Chief Manufacturing Inc.[12]
• Clearlight[13]
• Dataton[14]
• Dicomed[15]
• Double M Industries
• DSC Labs[16]
• Eastman Kodak(projectors)[17]
• Forox[18]
• Gepe[19]
• Hope
• Homrich
• Hostert[20]
• Image Marketing Corp[21]
• Kreonite[22]
• Marron Carrel (Maron)[23]
• Multivision
• Oxberry[24]
• Sickles (Mangum Sickles)
• Slidemagic (Maximillian Kerr Associates)
• Slide Transfer Service, Inc.
• Wess Plastics[25]
• Wing-Lynch

Notable Individuals in Multi-Image

• Andre Proulx[26]
• Bob Rowan
• Brien Lee[27]
• Christopher Korody[28]
• David Incencio
• Doug Mesney[29]
• Gar Benedick[30]
• Graham Emonson
• Jack Hollingsworth[31]
• Julien Biere[32]
• Keith Lanpher[33]
• Ken Burke[34]
• Marlyn Kulp
• Roger L. Gordon
• Ted Evans[35]
• Ted Iserman
• Todd Gipstein[36]
• Tony Korody[37]

External links

• Migration Productions